I love this channel for two reason: an impartial, academic coverage of Christian denominations, and the comment sections where everyone condemns everyone else for heresy.
**POLL QUESTIONS ARE FABULOUS** It gives folks a chance to interact with the many different faith statements from both familiar and unfamiliar denominations.
Apparently anything that requires some brain cells to comprehend is word salad. There's things in the Bible itself that requires much more critical thinking than any of these quotes.
@@Lynn-r8h the arrogance of people who didn't understand something to comment 'word salad?' instead of 'I don't think I understand; can someone explain what this is trying to say?' deserves no other response.
Yes. I assumed all the questions were taken from some doctrinal statement/staements of faith. They sometimes seem awkwardly worded because they are written by committees, trying to be concise while accurately reflecting their beliefs. “Word salad” to me just means meaningless words that don’t convey or promise anything. “Leadership will actualize this year’s performance plan to maximize our human capital’s resources to optimize output, strategize work-life balance while reaching our goals to maximize shareholder value”
I’ve yet to read one of your polls which struck me as “word salad.” The number of Christian’s who respond to these polls saying they don’t understand should give us pause for whether or not a significant number of respondents even understand their own beliefs.
I think it is many times a matter of terminology. I had a difficult time with the dancing question because I had to look up what "to redeem dance" was supposed to be.
I think "word salad" is a bit of a meme that was coming up there for a bit. Especially with the older quotes from ancient and medieval churches that use more archaic English. However, it is encouraging that people who had difficulty understanding the message of these statements are working on that by watching your channel!
It's why Christianity is dying off and abhorrent groups are growing exponentially. We can thank people like Leighton Flowers, Faith on fire TV, Vernon McGee, Independent Fundamentalist Baptists, Wesleyans, and other new and abhorrent groups steeped in heterodox roots for this. Tolerance for these groups really needs to end. A few generations their views would have been capital crimes. The fact that these heretics with no historic roots took our forefathers well intended tolerance to backbite them is repulsive to me. Effeminate semi Pelagians rife with Nestorian gaffs.
The issue I take with “agreeing” with many of the statements is that the theological terms being used are freighted with meanings that change based on denominational/cultural context. Take, for example: “I believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic church.” This is, of course, is an English translation of the Nicean Creed. Given its early adoption in Christian History, many Christians, whether Roman Catholic, Orthodox (Greek or otherwise), and even Protestants would “agree,” but they all would disagree with what it means. A Protestant might say it applies to the Church Invisible, whereas an Orthodox or Catholic person would say it refers specifically to the Orthodox or Catholic Church (respectively). Orthodox and Catholic people will disagree on what “Catholic” means, where the one might say it means “complete in itself; lacking nothing,” and the other would say it means “universal.” Someone on the outside of that particular argument would say the interlocutors are quibbling, whereas those inside the debate would say one emphasis or another has deep and important implications. Still others will disagree with assenting to the word “catholic” at all, thinking it smacks too much of papism. In short, there have been plenty of statements where, within my context (I am Greek Orthodox), I would agree, but I know or suspect that these statements have been made with different semantic values to what I initially assume. Hence, I usually say, “unsure/ just show results.” Although, now that I know the necessary qualification for a poll to make it to this video series, I’m going to start calling “word salad” on every poll.
Those who are not familiar with 18th, 19th, or even early 20th-century prose will have difficulty parsing many of these statements. They shout "word salad!" because they don't know what to make of statements which were perfectly intelligible to English speakers only 100 years ago.
Try reading "Utopia" by Sir Thomas More'. An entire page is *one sentence* (more or less) and quite challenging to read YET at the same time, efficient and complete.
If people think some of these are word salad, they've never read a legal document or any detailed writing, fiction or non-fiction...or parts of the New Testament for that matter. Just because a statement is precise, has a lot of dependent clauses, ambles through the flowery fields like a 19th century romance novel, or attempts to address all possibly consequences does NOT make it "word salad." Now, there IS such a thing as word salad. For example, "We advocate and applaud but consider with reasonable reservations creating a culture based on group accountability and personal self-sacrifice aided and fostered by unfettered individualism, complete independence, and benevolent greed." (Maybe someone else could do better.) Word salads tend to string together EMOTIVE TERMS or CATCH PHRASES. These phrases or words get people's attention and applause, but the entire statement can leave you thinking, "Whuuuut exactly did s/he just say?" or "That's not logical."
As someone that grew up Lutheran, I immediately was like "Hold on, I know that Lutheran-y statement" because for some reason, Lutheran writings *love* to talk in drawn out complicated statements
Possibly because many state churches are Lutheran, and thus theological statements must be more precise than "we believe in God" as a practical matter? When these things have real-world relevance they tend to get kind of wordy.
Martin Luther was a wicked man who mocked God and falsely accused Jesus of adultery. No one should follow the teachings of such a wicked man. As a former Lutheran, I would encourage you to research his autobiography, Martin Luther's Table Talk. In it, you'll find examples of frequent drunkenness, blasphemy, and the promotion of grave sins.
Remember that the Inquisition was still full in effect when the Protestant Reformation started. The Reformers had to submit their Confessions of faith to the Holy Roman Emperor and Kings to prevent put under the Inquisition. What most people don't know is that many Inquisitions were done by the state, not the Church. As a Protestant, I think we, Protestants, need to be truthful and repent on "inventing too many false Inquisition stories to discredit Roman Catholics... of course RC did the same as well".
People throwing "word salad" label on any sentence that is long and complex (which is the pre-TikTok way of writing sentences), even though you can follow and understand it. And yes, maybe you can't know what the sentence is exactly referring to by something, but that's almost always explained in the following sentences, not everything can be said in one sentence.
People have been condemning complicated sentences for well before the internet and certainty tiktok was invented. George Orwell: "Never use a long word where a short one will do." "If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out." "Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent." Text readably formulas are from before the internet; with the aim to get as low a score as possible. Before TikTok (but after the internet), people have published research recommending an average sentence length of 14 words. And the UK government has had a maximum of 25 words per sentence on their website dating back to 2014.
The quote from the Augsburg Confession is a fascinating example of how context is vital for these. I read the quote without the context and read "instruments" as "musical instruments," which (of course) made the statement nonsensical. But when you revealed that it's from the Augsburg Confession, I immediately realized that "instruments" was being used in the more technical sense, and it made perfect sense. Maybe some of the people claiming "word salad" are frustrated because they're lacking context?
That is often why I answer "Unsure". My first instinct is that I have no earthly clue what that means and I know there is some larger context for the statement but I don't know what it is supposed to be and it feels like cheating to just google it.
it seems like some people would like to be spoon fed theological statements that are worded in the language of a child. if one was clever enough one would be able to reword the apostles creed or nicene creed enough that some would accuse it of being word salad. for those who are christian it seems that the lack of catechesis amongst broad evangelicals has led to a loss of theological reading comprehension.
@@iagoofdraiggwyn98 yes, many of the comments belie a kind of pragmatist theology which says "what is the point of these theological statements? they dont promote evangelism, they dont feed people's souls, they dont build up the body". leaving these somewhat ignorant ideals aside, the point of these theological statements is not to be an exercise in 'academics', but to express in a succinct manner the theological/biblical position of a church on x matter. None of these statements are worded to be 'word salad' on purpose. Most of the accusations of word salad i think come from people who are largely unfamiliar with such statements or perhaps ones who are ill disposed to them because of similar (but not equivalent) statements by colleges/politicians/companies on hot button issues.
@@andresmartinezramos7513 true but one normally is supposed to be exposed to this kind of language through in depth catechesis. This is the case of historic confessional churches. but not so much the case in broad evangelicalism which (often) eschews confessions and creeds.
@@HenryLeslieGraham Back when I was being raised as a Catholic I went to catechesis as did the other kids in my village. I only started to pay attention by the time I started to have my suspicions that there was no God. I can't speak for my peers, but I wasn't an outlier. In denominations were there isn't even catechesis I suppose you must rely on what your parents teach you which is very likely to be in layman terms.
I think there is one group you may not be accounting for in the “not sure”. I’ve seen many of these questions on my feed, and answered many with “not sure” because I am not myself a Christian, but appreciate watching your channel for your informative and intellectual discussions of Christianity. I answered “not sure” to get an idea of the thoughts of your channel viewership at large, who I believe to be majority Christian.
I think he knows But most of us who fall in that category are probably answering with the last option most of the time. So a constant percentage aund 10-15%. He only points out when it is a significantly larger share, meaning many of the other 90-80% also weren't sure or didn't understand.
Thank you for posting all these quotations, from so many different sources, They give one a lot to think about - especially when one sees what different nuances people notice in them. Not only was dancing - even the waltz - once regarded as impermissible for Christians; so, at one time, was acting. It would be interesting to know what the history of these attitudes is. Christian ethics has undergone some remarkable changes. One wonders how widely smoking, or serving in the military, are regarded as impermissible for Christians
I went to (then) Calvin College in the mid/late seventies. Dances were NOT allowed on campus, and was frowned upon throughout the CRC. We'd get around it by having our dorms sponsor 'parties with music'. I think that's where the CRC's dancing affirmation comes from.
Love this channel. You are impartial. You give a clear and concise view of other religions and church development. The more I watch the more I realize that everyone has an opinion. Everyone has a way of worshiping what they call God. Everyone accuses the other one of being wrong. Why can’t we just love each other!
I really like your channel. I think some go with word salad just because they dont really understand it. Also, many have never read their denomination's statement of faith. If you want to hear true Word salad - watch a little Chuck Pierce 😊
If, as you claim, you are an unbeliever, I would think you'd spend your limited time elsewhere. Other than an atheist's perverse desire to corrupt Christians, what draws you to this channel?
Why must satanists masquerading as atheists try to convert Christians? If you really were an atheist, then you would live your best life. You would NOT waste one moment of time on Christians channels, attempting to convert Christians to your world view.
Ok Everything is NOT word salad Why are people calling clear easy to understand plain English "word salad"? Even the third one is not a word salad. It's a belief that holds contradiction, so the belief is a bit weird, but the description seems clear.
THANK YOU for explaining these poll questions, their intent and origins!! For the most part, they drive me nuts because there is usually a thread of truth but not in the whole, so I'm left frustrated! Thanks for explaining!
Humanae Vitae is definitely not word salad. It is a teaching of the Catholic Church. Admittedly, most Catholics dismiss it, though, which says a lot about the obedience of Catholics. :(
A church: puts out a very well-researched adequately nuanced theological statement to answer an important debate that spans centuries of church history, which most 21-century Christians are ignorant of and therefore needed to be laid out in extremely precise language. Average RU-vid commenters: *word salad*
It seems like all the people that boldly call these statements word salad are just boldly claiming that they have no reading comprehension skills and/or are just too lazy to think
Not sure how the statement from the Augsburg Confession about the Means of Grace being instruments through which the Holy Spirit is given could be clearer or even more concise.
4:00 I remember my dad telling me that they couldn't dance at school. He got a detention once for dancing as a joke. He went to a high school affiliated with the CRC.
I like the poll questions, I figured they were coming from some creed or another, and sometimes I get confused so I don’t answer them, but when I can, I like participating.
I’m a Catholic from the Philippines, and an Evangelical friend who attended CCF explained her understanding of the relationship between Faith and Works almost exactly like how the denomination/group phrased it.
Dear RTH, I appreciate your efforts to extend a greater understanding of the various Christian based Faith Methodologies, for even those of us who have been born and raised in the Judaeo-Christos cultures, find the variations of Christian belief confusing, if not outright mysterious. What I find even more interesting is that, while we can find many individuals who are more than willing to define, and even promote their specific belief methodology, few if ever actually inspect, and question the more more interesting nature of the "Belief Process" itself? Where does it arise, why does it emerge, what are its effects upon our lives, and the lives of those around us? Since beliefs define our perceptions of what is "real", this begins to explore larger and more fundamental perceptions, that most individuals are unwilling or outright contrary to unraveling.
Maybe people are confused as to what word salad actually mean. It is supposed to mean incoherent or garbled speech. In Norwegian, we have a word for something below word salad: "kansellistil" ("Chancery Style" or more liberally translated "Government Style"), which refers to text that is coherent, meaningfull and possible to understand, but which uses unnecessarily complex or difficult language. "Chancery Style" text will often (1) use passive sentences; (2) use long sentences with lots of subordinate clauses, running for lines on end; and (3) use loanwords from other languages or resort to technical terms, when a proper Norwegian every-day alternative does exists. It's basically the very thing the Plain Language movement is combatting. And maybe that's what people think word salad is.
PART of the problem with these statements, is the “Theological terminology “. These were written by Scholars , so us “lay people “ may find the wording difficult. [ Love this Channel. Always learning interesting things - especially about other Christians, and From other Christians.] ✝️🙏🙂
Very interesting probe into a sample of the Christian community through the use of statements of faith. Would love to see these on a quarterly or yearly basis. Thanks for doing this video
The person is correct about some languages not having grammatical gender. For example, I speak Persian and the pronoun او (oo) is used for men, women, and most inanimate objects. آن (ān or oon, there are two pronunciations, the latter is more colloquial) is used for animals. Either way, if you wrote something like, "tanhā yek khoda wājūd dārad, va ooh dar osman zendegi mïkonad," it could be translated as, "there is only one God and (he she or it) lives in heaven." I won't make an affirmative statement about the question regarding gender, just stating that not every language has grammatical gender in the same way English does, thus not every translation of the Bible is even capable of dealing with this issue.
Most if not all of these statements are taken from creedal/confessional documents (or heavily derived linguistically from them) that are at least 100 years old. What this tells me is not that these statements are horribly outdated in their linguistic mannerisms, but that contemporary Christians are woefully disassociated from the ways that Christians have spoken and written over 2,000 years. EDIT: I'm not saying familiarity with these things should be a requirement for entry, but if longterm Christian discipleship is not exposing believers to the way that the historic church speaks, then we're not doing our jobs right.
I think some things seem like word salad, and I have said that about some of the these polls, is that some of them is worded in a way that we are not used to. Words matter and how you express an idea matters. So there are some that I agree with some of it and not other parts of it or some I just flat out do not understand. I think my understanding of reading in general is fairly comprehensive . Some of the quotes are from distant past and/or some are from different traditions. Don't be so hard on some of us who don't get it. If you don't understand what they are trying to say, it seems like word salad.
@bethvaughn4231 It *seems like word salad is a farcry from it being word salad is my point. After a long enough time being exposed to "Christianese," these paragraphs read fairly naturally. My frustration is with communities of faith that don't simply lower the bar of intellectual entry but dumb down the theological vocabulary and mock the carefully worded statements of our past (as irrelevant "word salad") -- I grant that not everyone is at the same place, but we should also be moving in a certain trajectory as a community to get more acquainted with how Christians talk. This has little to nothing to do with reading comprehension as such.
Ready to Harvest is the most thought provoking site, which I so appreciate. Often contemplate what Christ would have thought about having a religion named after him, while also wondering since so many Christians follow the teachings of Paul, why don't they call themselves Paulist's? What would the writers of the Torah/Tanakh (old testament) and those who wrote the new testament have thought of modern medicine, the vast choices in food, all the forms of travel to places they had never heard of much less seen, as well as the many forms of politics and educational choices? Since so many of the rules back then were based on the choices available at the time.
Wow! First time that I've seen CCF referred to by name as part of the greater Christian community. My brother is an elder in this church. I don't belong, but I have learned about many good things they do. Thanks for sharing this.
That's neat! I actually have a video on CCF too that you may find interesting: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-yPkkmsrq6zk.htmlsi=2gACSP5C8-wiHVt0
People that think some of these are word salad simply don’t read enough older literature. The first three, for example, were extremely well written. We are losing our ability to understand precise language. You see, that is the goal of a large vocabulary………….precision. When our societal vocabulary shrinks, we tend to lose the more exacting language for more ubiquitous “umbrella” words. We end up saying “I love pizza” and “I love my wife”. Were getting dumber
I don't think people understand that just because it's a compound sentence doesn't mean it's word salad. For a lot of these it seems like people are saying it just to say it.
I respect the Ethiopian Orthodox church because they preserved The Book of Enoch and The Division of Days. Sadly, the Ethiopian Orthodox churches have become apostate, because they adopted the practice of idolatry or iconography. The grave sin of idolatry includes making, possessing, or worshiping any image (carved or painted) of any created thing (insects, mammals, angels).
@@FidgetyGuyI'm not sure of the Ethiopian position but the Orthodox position in general, in my understanding, is that the icons aren't to be worshipped but represent the presence of the saints in the worship, the eternality of the eucharist, and to be reminders of past events and the history of the church. As far as praying to saints the official position is they aren't praying to saints but asking the saints to pray with them, similar to how you would ask any other brother or sister to pray with you.
@@FidgetyGuyThey have the Ark of The Covenant too. Edit lol i just finished reading the rest of your comment. Did Moses commit Idolatry when he fashioned the Golden Serpent in the desert? What about when the Israelites inscribed Cherubim into the Tabernacle? What about in Solomons temple? Did he commit idolatry in Gods temple where His presence truly dwelt? Do I commit idolatry when I draw a horse on a piece of paper? Are you Muslim? Get real dude
@@DANtheMANofSIPA You're speaking about Nehushtan; which is the symbol of a snake on a pole. Symbols are not prohibited by the law of God. The proto-Hebrew alphabet has the Aleph; which is the symbol of a steer head. We are allowed to use symbols for the purpose of illustration. Now, you mentioned this verse: Numbers 21:8-9 Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Make a snake image and mount it on a pole. When anyone who is bitten looks at it, he will recover.’ So Moses made a bronze snake and mounted it on a pole. Whenever someone was bitten, and he looked at the bronze snake, he recovered. However, you failed to mention what was done to the pole: 2 Kings 18:4 He removed the high places, smashed the sacred stones and cut down the Asherah poles. He broke into pieces the bronze snake Moses had made, for up to that time the Israelites had been burning incense to it.
Hey just for clarification, I (almost) always answer "Not sure" even when I can answer, because I am an Atheist, and I think an overwhelming majority of these theological questions are only meaningfully answered by Christians.
@@russianvalkyrie2358 I like to see the results though and the only way to do that is to vote not sure. I can't think of one of the top of my head but I think I only answered one other one because it did not seem like a theological question.
It seems a lot the things that get called word salad are really just statements that use complex sentence structure and more difficult vocabulary. I'd be curious to see the response to the same statements if they were re-written at the 7th-8th grade reading level, which is the average in the US.
I think when people describe a statement as "word salad," they often mean that the statement is overly convoluted or misleading rather than confusing. It's a case of the "I don't think that word means what you think it means" meme. Also, could you do a video about the Appalachian churches that practice snake handling and the drinking of poison?
I guess I live a sheltered life, thank God. Until this episode, from one of my favorite RU-vid content creators, I had never heard of "word salad" before. This tiny sample of those so labeling these statements, seem to me to indicate their substandard level of reading comprehension.
Great video! There are several reasons a statement can seem like word salad: It is only a couple sentences out of a longer work. The context may make it much clearer. Different Christian groups and denominations use different terminology, or define those terms differently, or just refer to the faith in different ways that others are unfamiliar with. Statements in other languages may lose something in translation to English. Even in English, people spoke quite differently a few hundred years ago. Some statements are so blatantly anti-Scriptural that it leaves us to shake our heads. Some are just plain poorly written.
Theological language, especially of faith statements needs to be precise, like legal language. I don't think that any of the statements I've seen so far in these polls amount to word salad. I do quibble sometimes with the theological emphases behind the statements, as I suppose I would being a Catholic.
In many debates with atheists, I've seen them use "word salad" when they hear an argument they don't like/ don't understand / aren't open-minded enough to listen to. I think alot of people re-act that way when the philosophical waters get deep. Tbf though, I've been lost on some of your poll questions. But I just assume it's some internal debate I've never heard of. I wonder if Christians outside the Anglo-sphere think it's wierd for Christians to be "uptight" about dance.
Most people who think these are word salads should read the Terms and Conditions pages for having a RU-vid account........or their financing paperwork for their car loan or mortgage.😂
Seems many in the audience arent far to the right of the curve. The idea that ultimaye truth shouldnt take multiple readings tells me those people have never done anything remotely complex and are utterly ignorant of the truth and how the world of knowledge is. Very lazy.
I like that you do not tell those taking the poll which denomination made the statement; however, depending on the denomination, the words used may have different meanings.
The Grace Communion International statement of wrath as love are neither word salad nor unorthodox. That position can be defended in Patristics as well as modern scholarship, and throughout Church history in general.
There’s always gonna be a “word salad” commenter. Try reading books from before the 1930s, especially any books that are academic, and the authors always sound like word salad because they not only have to cram a lot of information into a document, but they also have to be as clear and cover as many points of argument as possible. Which leads to a lot of run-on sentences like I just used. When people aren’t used to reading, it gets hard when there’s more than five words per sentence and multisyllabic words as well. Don’t worry about RU-vid commenters. You’re doing a wonderful job!
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. " Ehm ekzcuse me that's word salad ☝️🤓
not really, because from the context, it is plainly referring to Jesus, who some folks think of as a separate 'God', this verse is pointing out that Jesus is clearly the "I AM".
Seems that there may be multiple issues: a) As others have said, unfamiliarity with formal language (both vocabulary and structure), never mind the specific language of apologetics and theology. As someone else mentioned it's like saying about some document presented in court "that's legalese" -- well yes of course it is! b) Aversion to "I don't get it". A mental block, maybe nonconscious, about something being just beyond what the person can grasp. So you get "if it makes no sense to me it must be nonsense" rather than "ok maybe I'm missing something important." c) Related to both those, a widespread cultural notion that every subject should be easily accessible to the common layperson and if it's not then then they may be pulling a fast one on you or it's ivory-tower frippery. But some things just ARE complicated and not obvious by "common sense".
To call these statements a word salad is flumoxing. We are supposedly a literate society, but the number of people who find even simple assertions to be overly verbose is astounding, and worse when the particular passage is little more than a rewording of Scripture. If this is the authentic feeling of most people, I fear for the state of the church. I would also like to know how often these people are reading their Bibles and which versions they use. I have a feeling that the popular use of dynamic translations and paraphrases has contributed to the lack of theological comprehension.
